A former driving instructor from Boston was handed a sentence of two years' probation, with a stipulation for the first six months to be under home confinement with GPS monitoring, following a guilty plea to conspiracy charges for corrupting the driver's license testing process. Ngan Dinh, 48, was also ordered to pay a $4,000 fine and forfeit $5,450, after admitting to conspiring to commit honest services mail fraud back in March of this year.
Acting on a venture that preyed upon the trust of the Vietnamese community in Boston, Dinh promised driver's licenses to those who had not passed or, in some instances, even taken the road test as required by the Registry of Motor Vehicles (RMV). Dinh's clientele, primarily Vietnamese immigrants with limited English proficiency, sought his aid to navigate the RMV's rules and were instead caught in a scheme where Dinh exchanged cash for false promises of licensure, as noted by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
The case unveiled how Dinh, who is a naturalized U.S. citizen, leveraged language barriers and misinformation, telling applicants lies such as the RMV had stopped offering road tests due to the pandemic. He claimed to hold the title of a 'certified rep' for the RMV, which does not exist, and could secure them licenses regardless of their testing status. Customers were duped into paying sums up to $1,200, all in cash, under the guise that they were complying with RMV procedures.
Moreover, the corrupted link extended to an RMV road test examiner in Brockton, who Dinh bribed with $100 per customer to falsely report passing grades on road tests. According to officials including Acting United States Attorney Joshua S. Levy, Michael J. Krol, of Homeland Security Investigations, and Christopher A. Scharf, from the U.S. Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General, their cooperative investigation led to Dinh's conviction. Their announcements shed light on the gravity of undermining public trust for personal gain.
The case was brought forward by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Christine J. Wichers and Adam W. Deitch of the Public Corruption & Special Prosecution Unit. It shines a spotlight not only on the individual culpability of Dinh and his accomplice within the RMV but also on the vulnerabilities of immigrant communities to such fraudulent predators, and the critical need for vigilant oversight in public services to protect the integrity of essential systems and the safety of our roads.
